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Tallbloke towers raided: many computers taken

An Englishman’s home is his castle they say. Not when six detectives from the Metropolitan Police, the Norfolk Constabulary and the Computer Crime division arrive on your doorstep with a warrant to search it though.

I waved the first three in and bid them head through to the sitting room, where there was less of an chill near the woodburner. Then they kept coming, being introduced by the lead detective from Norfolk as they trooped in. I thought I’d been chosen to host the secret policemen’s ball or something. :)

I managed to log out of my email on the big lappy as they sat down, to the annoyance of the Computer expert. he soon regained his composure though and asked his first question.

How many computers do you have in the house?

Oh, I’m not sure… around twenty.

I breezily replied. :):)

Some glances were exchanged.

“So where are they” he asked.

“Most of them are up in the attic bedroom. We’re in the middle of decorating it. You’ll have to mind the wet paint…”

After surveying my ancient stack of Sun Sparcstations and PII 400 pc’s, they ended up settling for two laptops and an adsl broadband router. I’m blogging this post via my mobile.

I got the feeling something was on the go last night when WordPress forwarded a notice from the U.S. Department of Justice. I’ll post it tomorrow once I get access to the net from a bigger keyboard sorted out.

UPDATE 15-12-2011

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Tallbloke – I hope it all blows over and it turns out to be a very minor pain in the arse. Of course, if it turns out you have a ‘Russian server’ in your attic, things might get messy for a while. Drop me a line and I’ll swing the interest Briffa’s way ;)

Best of luck and I hope Norfolk’s ‘finest’ were civilised in their ridiculous behaviour.

[…] it happened. Tallbloke, a fellow recipient of the climategate 2.0 emails just had his house raided by the Metropolitan Police, the Norfolk Constabulary and the Computer Crim… in what is apparently a coordinated effort by the US U.S. Department of Justice Criminal Division […]

[…] The Air Vent. It seems that the world governments are escalating cliamtegate to the next level. Tallbloke a fellow recipient blog of the climategate emails, and linked on the right, was raided tod… in what seems to be a coordinated effort by Metropolitan Police, the Norfolk Constabulary and the […]

Finking about the “hacker” from a 2 second google the UEA used to give instructions about how to log onto one of their ftp servers here, but then hid them where nobody would think of looking – the internet:

*quote*UEA will set up a ftp directory in November, into which groups should copy their report
files (ideally these should be in Office 97 format). (This has been done. The ftp server ishttp://ftp.cru.uea.ac.uk, log in as an anonymous user using your email address as a password,
change to the directory /incoming/accord. Please email Clare Goodess with the names of
the files you have left in the directory and try to use self-explanatory names, e.g.
ueafinal.doc, ueafig1.ps)*end of quote*

You’ve been nailed by Title 18, Part 1, Chapter 121, para 2703 of the U.S. Code, which states, among other things:

“A court order for disclosure under subsection (b) or (c) may be issued by any court that is a court of competent jurisdiction and shall issue only if the governmental entity offers specific and articulable facts showing that there are reasonable grounds to believe that the contents of a wire or electronic communication, or the records or other information sought, are relevant and material to an ongoing criminal investigation.”

Don’t ask me how the Norfolk Police are able to invoke the US Code to get a warrant to search a house in Yorkshire, but please note that this is a criminal investigation. So stand behind the archers and keep you sword arm free, okay?

[…] the last to know!!! Anyway, it seems likely while I was out shopping for Christmas knick-knacks, Tallbloke was raided, and his computers were seized. Meanwhile the U.S. Department of Justice seems to have […]

Sorry to hear that the Jack Booted Thugs are still acting like, er, Jack Booted Thugs. People sometimes forget that there were administrators and politicians giving them their orders which they usually unhesitatingly followed.

The best way to expose tyranny is to shine a bright light on it. The world-wide skeptic community will stand behind you Tallbloke… you are not alone. We will make sure that this injustice against you is spread all over the net. I think this act marks the beginning of the end of the “great” AGW scare.

TallBloke….. I *adored* your posting! Were it me, I’d be shaking in confusion, for days.

Your humor, wit, intelligence — resolve? — came through.

Whatever happens, it seems certain *you* will survive quite well. …Lady in Red
PS: Good luck with the attic redecoration, too! Maybe it’s time for a couple of days of more painting and making new curtains? …smile…

Meanwhile on the next episode of the Bill…
“Cor! It’s the Filth!”
“Right! You’re nicked Sunstation!”

But seriously, what do they hope to achieve by this harassment? Is it;

A. They are so foolish they do not realise that the whistle blower was a disillusioned and disgusted scientist with internal access to UEA servers?

B. They are so foolish they think a comment posted on a remotely hosted wordpress blog site will leave a address pointing to anything more than a random Internet cafe on Tallblokes home PC?

C. Keeping the false “hacker” meme alive with “computers were seized in the ongoing search for the Climategate hacker” stories to avoid embarrassment for idiot MPs who made the hacking claims?

D. Harassing and intimidating climate sceptics in the hope of enraging “FOIA” the whistle blower to the point of releasing the deadman code for the 200,000 further encrypted emails, in the hope of catching them when they do?

If “D” is the motivation, I would have some points for the Norfolk police;

A. If you couldn’t stop FOIA getting several hundred megabytes transmitted around the world anonymously, what are your chances of catching them releasing a mere 8000 character text file?

B. Even if you find who FOIA is, they will be covered by UK whistle blower legislation. Your masters will likely tell you to drop it. The government and UN story is “Hacker”. “Whistle blower” does not help the AGW hoax.

C. You will look foolish if their name was under your nose for two years.

D. The filter used to select the recently released 5000 emails was designed to pick up on primarily scientific concerns. However, caught up in the released files were around 30 or so indicating inappropriate contact with UEA, the World Bank and Goldman Sachs. This is the tip of a very big iceberg waiting in the 200,000 encrypted emails. Think “Pandora’s Box”. Are you really, really sure you want to open that?

Tallbloke, I got informed of a WordPress subpoena from the US Congress against my blog–I didn’t get raided in person.

They were annoyed because I said Republican Senator Thad Cochran was a rabid dog who deserved to get put down at the next electoral opportunity. The morons at the US Congress took this as a death threat.

The American Civil Liberties Union defended me, successfully. They were brilliant. You don’t expect an organization that big to be that good at their mission, but the ACLU is. If you like, I’ll be happy to try to hook you up with them. Reply to commentmnstr via the googley mail thing.

I want to chip in, agree with, and amplify Sean’s advice above. When you get those laptops back, don’t use them for anything until you’ve pulled the hard drives and reloaded your OS and all apps from known-good original install media.

Put the original hard drives in external drive chassis to access the data files only. They should be assumed to be infected with all kinds of trojans, keyloggers, and therefore should not be opened without extreme care. For instance, do not just double-click a data file icon that might actually be binaries that will infect your system. Explicitly open the file from inside the appropriate application, and disable all macros. If you can open MS Office documents in OpenOffice instead, all the better.

If the HDs are compatible, you can get away with erasing one after you recover your data, then using it as the new HD for the second computer.

I am sorry to hear of your inconvenience and I certainly hope it is nothing more than that. While the letter of some law is I’m sure being followed, the spirit of free inquiry and open exchange of ideas is being compromised here. Hang in there – we are with you.

BTW: When the computers are returned, don’t trust their integrity. If at all possible, leave them in the sealed evidence bags until they can be vetted by an independent party. Check the seals. Consider the hardware to be compromised as well as the system’s data until they are independently verified.

If the equipment is returned in an unsealed condition, place it in sealable bags in the presence of those returning the computers, seal the bags (procure suitable bags while you wait) and have the officer returning the computers that the bags were sealed in their presence.

Do not accept the equipment if they refuse such a request. Do not sign anything that says the equipment has been returned. Make other arrangements.

[…] seems that the world governments are escalating cliamtegate to the next level. Tallbloke a fellow recipient blog of the climategate emails, and linked on the right, was raided tod… in what seems to be a coordinated effort by Metropolitan Police, the Norfolk Constabulary and the […]

FWIW, this action has done one very important thing: I’m now VERY VERY INTERESTED in going through the ClimateGate emails with a fine tooth come. I’d been mostly ignoring them, figuring someone else would do it. IF those emails are THIS important, well, pull out all the stops!

Sidebar on decryption: If the cops are looking for some magic decryption key, it may well be that the leaker is doing a Brute Force Decryption. A small cluster of computers can just brute force it, one email at a time, looking for a result with a high number of ‘hits’ on a dictionary (i.e. words showing up). Given the time lag between CG1 and CG2 there has been enough time to decrypt a few out of the many. It may well be that The Powers That Be (scared…) are trying to get to the originator before they crack the “Good Stuff”…

This can be enhanced if you have some idea what some of the tokens would be. (This was helpful in cracking Enigma in W.W.II when Germans tended to close with a fairly reliable “Heil Hxxxx” ). If you have a known email layout and known names…

Tallbloke, I am surprised that you did not prevent them from taking away your equipment. I would imagine that they would have needed a warrant signed by a magistrate. The warrant should have spelled out exactly what they wanted to do. If they have overstepped the warrant you should be able to get immediate redress (return of the equipment and some compensation). Did not those Irish suppose bombers get compensation? I think this is a stupid act by an incompetent Police Force. If you have a Tory local MP I suggest you stir the pot. I suggest also to contact James Delingpole to get attention in the press. Hopefully, there will be a friendly lawyer who can help you get compensation. Money is a bit tight but I will see if I can put in a bit.
It is time that someone took the alarmist and spreaders of untruths to court.

Tallbloke, sorry to hear the thought police have descended upon you and your computers. A word of advice, even though you have nothing to fear or hide, get a lawyer and don’t say anything until you do. In general policemen are not the smartest and can be prone to misconstruing simple facts just to fit their their wild hunches and theories. Also, setup a new email address – someone I know who was wrongly accused by the local plods had his laptop confiscated and the police were using it not only to look through old emails but also to check new messages being sent to him.

So what could they possibly hope to find on a router? Proof that your computers were connected to the phone network?
Or do they not have the faintest idea what they were supposed to be looking for?
Any household with a digital camera, satnav, MP3 player, Kindle etc. etc. will have tens of giagabytes of storage tucked away in odd corners. Confiscate the lot!
And no search for postage stamp sized SD memory cards?

Tall Bloke
Did they give you grounds for removing your property.
If you haven’t already I suggest you record exactly what happened and what was said and seek legal advice. I posted at CA suggesting you contact Leigh and Co, who have been in the news re the treatment of whistleblower’s in the NHS.
Best regards
S

Good luck with your dealing with the police, they will of course be monitoring traffic on this blog so bear that in mind.

While it is entirely legitimate for them to follow leads related to an investigation, sending 6 detectives seems rather heavy handed. What did they expect to find! Another example of the disappointing decision making that seems to dog everyday policing at the expense of annoying those who ought to be on their side. Clumsy!!

tallbloke, I once got accidentally caught up in a police raid in London. They didn’t get the guy they wanted, so they nominated me. Their case was dreadful, but was bolstered by false claims and tampering with evidence – e.g. I voluntarily surrendered some money, new issue banknotes from a particular bank. In court the police produced all old notes, even changed the pounds to 2x50p claimed I’d recived the money for my part in a crime. The jury swallowed it, except for one who fortunately persuaded those who thought me guilty that there was some doubt. I would have been jailed for at least three years if not for him, having not been involved in the matter the police were investigating.

My grandfather was a PC, an uncle was a chief super, I’ve always been trusting. But I learned in this case never, ever, trust the police when they have you in their sights. Best of British luck, old bean, keep your passport handy just in case.

Modest donation from a senior citizen who used to have great respect for the forces of law and order. Hope it sorts itself out without too much hassle. I agree get some legal advice and contact Delingpole. I look forward to reading your updates.

Do you consider yourself a criminal mastermind?
The constables probably do. Looking for that evidence…of what?
Trying to understand a planet and solar system that scientists corrupted with bad theories and bad logic.

Do you not think many scientists should be the ones the police should be harassing?

[…] the ever well informed Katabasis my attention has been drawn to the rather worrying seizure of computers owned by UK climate sceptic bloggers. Apparently at the behest of the U.S. Department of Justice as other climate bloggers have received […]

Very Amaturish. I remember an episode when networks were young. A similar attempt when a keyboard was removed from a single computer – not from the rest of the PCs that all had access to the same shares on the network.

Came here from WUWT and left a donation. When I started following this topic years ago, people argued the SCIENCE. A fool’s errand because it is not about the science and never was; it has always been about the money and power. Thank you for standing tall on the Rampart of Freedom against the Forces of Darkness as the Evil Empire strikes back.

Should you ever have a reason to visit the heart of Texas, give us a shout. It would be our honor to take you to eat BBQ and drink beer, and shoot guns, and go to a good bible thumping church service. (And all of the other things Texans are supposed to do!)

I am truly sorry for the violation of your privacy, the confiscation of your property, and the distress this event has imposed on you.

Several people have suggested you obtain support of a lawyer. But at this stage there is no reason for that. Indeed, there is no possibility of useful legal advice or action unless and until
(a) you are accused of something
or
(b) the police fail to return your property.

Furthermore, the law may not be applicable. If the investigation is considered to be a matter of national security then the investigators can do whatever they like and are protected from prosecution by the Security Act. Indeed, I notice that you do not mention them showing a Search Warrant which they must have done if they were entering your property to observe any of its contents as part of a criminal investigation. Their not showing a Search Warrant implies they thought their visit was part of their conducting a national security investigation.

So, at present your best and most effective protection is publicity and – fortunately – you are getting it.

Please keep us informed of any developments. We want to know of them because we care. More importantly, updates on the matter will keep the matter alive in the public forum, and publicity is your best protection.

Don’t let them get you down. If you could post up a copy of the warrant, that would be nice. I’d be interested to know if this originated on your side of the Atlantic or mine. If there is anything I can do to help, you’ve got my e-mail.

“But British police have not determined who stole the emails. Recent reports of police expenditures suggest they may be devoting far fewer resources to it than other similar investigations.” – as seen by Michael E. Mann in his WSJ opinion of 5th December.

My reaction when I read this was that the police should spend their money on investigating real crime – I think that any burglary in Norfolk should be higher up their priority list than this “theft” if theft it was.

The chickens have the priority over the climategate 2 emails in my opinion. Hey, the poor mites will be dead and the evidence mostly consumed in ten days’ time.

I live in Norfolk myself, and am slightly embarrassed that via my council tax I have helped to fund this action. Still, it’s nice to see all the good folks here rally around to offer their support – warms the heart, it does.

I would strongly suggest that you go one step further and not just wipe the laptops but replace both along with the ADSL router. I don’t know what brand of router it is but many brands/models can have the firmware easily replaced or modified. In the event that you cannot replace the laptops, I would use Darik’s boot-n-nuke application to perform a DoD level wipe on the devices. A format and/or fdisk will NOT guarantee that they are clean.

I would still strongly recommend that you do find a way to replace the router however.

[…] has finally provoked the legal machine into taking action. Against bloggers. UK blogger Tallbloke had computers seized and the Air Vent and Climate Audit have been threatened with action too. Jo Nova is enraged, and […]

Have just received a most courteous e-mail from the hard-pressed James Delingpole. He’s on the case! Hopefully my modest Paypal contro will see you all right for some printer ink! Don’t let the bastards grind you down, and watch your back!

[…] of things. There are several classes of dissenting voices and I don’t rate up there with the big whistleblowers. And since I’ve written so little on Climategate or Climategate 2.0, it seems I’ll be […]

If the speculation there is on the money (and these blokes are considerably smarter than your average Detective Lieutenant), then this police investigation either is part of a cover-up effort looking for a scapegoat, or is eventually going to learn something humiliating to CRU and the IPCC.

You’re not alone mate and you’ve got my full support. ‘We’ in Oz are getting sick and tired of our politicians too, with the degradation of our freedom and liberty, which is only surpassed by that in the You Kay but more insidiously in the You Ess Aye.

The defendants will claim, he said, that it was “lawful for them to damage the chimney in order to protect other property – other property, you’ll hear, in Kent and all around the world, other property said to be at the risk of much more serious damage: threatened by the consequences of climate change which is caused by the substantial increase in what are generally termed as greenhouse gases, to which it is said coal fired power stations make a very large contribution.”

Of course, they’ll have to tell you what law you broke that you had a good reason to break.

I can understand their use of brute force and property seizure. Apparently they have only more recently become concerned that the whole global warming scientific fraud could indeed be demolished by one keystroke from foia, and the release of further emails.

Whether the global and governmental institutions involved in this fraud will be able to prevent this from happening, is now the question.

Thanks to tallbloke for his suffering through this, it is for the good. The scoundrels in Durban want to raise hundreds of billions of dollars on international shipping, and reduce land used for farm land. And as foia says,

‘“Over 2.5 billion people live on less than $2 a day.”
“One dollar can save a life” — the opposite must also be true.’

I agree with Foxgoose that what Greg Laden wrote appears to be libelous. Even if you don’t want to involve an attorney, at minimum I suggest you write Laden requesting he take down his post and put up one apologizing for besmirching your reputation. Here is the full URL of his post.

these words from last weeks seems to be written with You in mind. Did they know something in advance?

“Strasbourg, 08.12.2011 – The Council of Europe Committee of Ministers today alerted its member states about the risks to the rights to freedom of expression and association that may be created by politically motivated pressure on Internet platforms and online service providers. It also expressed concern about the threat to these rights caused by cyber attacks against websites of independent media, whistleblowers, human right defenders and dissidents. ”

and from link in above link:
“7. The Committee of Ministers, therefore:

– alerts member States to the gravity of violations of Articles 10 and 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights which might result from politically motivated pressure exerted on privately operated Internet platforms and online service providers, and of other attacks against websites of independent media, human rights defenders, dissidents, whistleblowers and new media actors;

– underlines, in this context, the necessity to reinforce policies that uphold freedom of expression and the right to impart and receive information, as well as the right to freedom of assembly and association, having regard to the provisions of Articles 10 and 11 of the Convention and the related case law of the European Court of Human Rights;”

To me it seems they “alerted its member ” about “politically motivated pressure on Internet platforms and online service providers.” as they say in their own words.

Roger,
As an ex-plod please, please can I beg you to never, ever say one word to any police officer without having a lawyer present, and make sure that your lawyer is one switched-on cookie.
The very worst thing you can do is to presume that because you are totally innocent you are free to speak. In the Nick, you are NOT innocent, you are just not-yet-proven guilty. It’s the Police mind-set.
I’ve spoken to a number of both serving and retired officers and they all think that you are like a ripe plum, just ready for plucking by the right bent bastard (senior) officer.
I have no problems whatsoever in signing this with my name and giving my correct e-mail address, which you are at complete liberty to withhold from any other Plods until they have given you Chapter and Verse under which legislation they are demanding it (in the presence of a damned good lawyer).

[“Now that six policemen from the Norfolk and Metropolitan forces have invaded the home and “borrowed” the computers of “Tallbloke”, the first blogger in the UK to reveal the existence of the 5000 Climategate 2.0 emails,…”]

We are all behind you with this, and I see, thankfully, with courtesy, humour, and concern for the real truth about the stinking corruption in Climate Science to come out so that the mess can be cleaned up and the science processes reformed.

@Zeke It is obvious that the people who sent the emails records know the encrypted ones texts. It is like saying: You are done…just wait and see. A kind of “vendetta dolce vendetta” (“Revenge sweet revenge”)….but, again, what is it really in play here? Not “global warming” of course…perhaps something pretty hotter :-)

more importantly, how much is Exxon paying to the UAE? How much does Exxon give to Michael Mann? Is there a link between Exxon and Al Gore?

This whole false meme about big oil and those of us who are sceptics about the garbage that is proclaimed by these globull alarmists is getting extremely tired.

Take for example the latest in alarmism from Australia regarding things like “there will be a growth in the number of reported cases in Dengue Fever”. Really? According to QLD Health, the mosquito that carries Dengue Fever, must first bite a carrier who brought the disease back from somewhere in the Tropics, such as Bali. I would actually think that there might be exponential growth due to more people visiting Bali, Fiji or some other exotic location where dengue fever is known to exist, than to any local threat in Australia… but hey, what would I know?

Oh, the shame of it all! TallBloke, I only joined your blogsite 12 short days ago and I am already in trouble with THE MAN!!!! ;-)

Seriously, I would say I like your post and your response, but there really needs to be a “DisLike” button to press here, as well as a “Seriously???!!! WTF!!!???” button….

And typical, rather than go after the charlatans and frauds who take our tax dollars in return for lying to us and conning us out of even more of our money, they are only after those who ratted them out…

Isn’t all the information in those emails subject to FOIA laws anyway? Aren’t we legally entitled to know everything in those emails already? So where is the crime? I mean, other than the crimes committed in these emails by those who wrote them in the first place….

Here in the US, 30 years ago Woodward and Bernstein were heroes because they kept digging to find out the truth about WaterGate…. today their computers would have been seized and they would be jailed….

I find the whole idea of having your equipment confiscated by the police as tyranical in an extreme. One thing is for sure, if you are that big of a threat just for writing words, the foundations of their crime must be so flimsy that they must protect it from anything sharp, because it might pop under investigation. GOOD JOB!!!

Is it not curious, one can spend years trying to get a public funded scientist to release their data and meta data (McIntyre vs Mann, and many other examples) or one can submit FOI requests to the IPCC (found guilty of subverting the scientific process on numerous ocassions) reciepients of world wide attention for their policy recomendations affecting every man woman and child on the planet, and have these GSE efforts stonewalled to no end, but on the otherhand you can be a common citizen, with a deserved reputation for being an open minded well informed, well educated man, and with nary a notice the authorties can come into your home and take all your computer files and poor through all your private records. It just ain’t right.

Tallbloke,
I think that I’ve done all that I can to help shine lots of bright lights on the situation.
Hope that it works out well and that you will be justly rewarded for tolerating the inconvenience.

Josh did a wonderful job with the illustration except that he has you standing in a hole and failed to draw any SPARCstations. :-)

Patently, he’s an idiot but the “I can not be sued by” means he’s not only ignorant of the law but illiterate too, which offends the bloodless grammarian in me deeply. “Cannot” you idjit, not “can not”. When in doubt, at least go for “can’t” you fool.

In an effort to wriggle out of being accused of libel Greg Laden has updated his post. But he has not retracted the malicious assertion contained in the title. Tallbloke’s computers are the only ones seized.

Therefore, it still remains Laden’s contention that Tallbloke is a “Criminal Cyber-Thief”.

Computers of Criminal Cyber-Thieves Seized (updated)

Paragraph changes:
Original:
Thieves who broke into Unviersity of East Anglia computers in 2009, stealing thousands of private emails thus compromising years of expensive scientific research and causing a fabricated and unnecessary political doo-doo storm, as part of a much larger campaign of harassment, have had some of their computer equipment seized by UK authorities.

Now:
Thieves who broke into Unviersity of East Anglia computers in 2009, stealing thousands of private emails thus compromising years of expensive scientific research and causing a fabricated and unnecessary political doo-doo storm, as part of a much larger campaign of harassment, are being pursued by the authorities, through the seizure of computer equipment that appears to be linked to the storage and dissemination of the stolen documents, and which has been seized under search warrant.

——————
Original:
So, apparently it is OK for Tattersall and his band of thieves to unilaterally play vigilante and break into your computer or mine, but when authorities investigating a crime, with proper search warrant, show up to investigate his misdeeds, suddenly he’s an “Englishman” in his “Castle.” I don’t know whether to laugh of to go medieval on him.

Now:
So, apparently it is OK for Tattersall and this band of thieves to unilaterally play vigilante and break into your computer or mine, but when authorities investigating a crime, with proper search warrant, show up to investigate his misdeeds, suddenly he’s an “Englishman” in his “Castle.” I don’t know whether to laugh of to go medieval on him.

‘And I swear that for the future I shall neither say nor assert orally or in writing such things as may bring upon me similar suspicions. And if I know any heretic, or one suspected of heresy, I will denounce him to this Holy Office, or to the Inquisitor or Ordinary of the place in which I may be.’

I haven’t read everything here, so my apologies if the following is redundant in whole or in part:

I suggest that you forget saving for a new laptop. What you may need much more is a first rate lawyer who can put you in touch with an expert in electronic surveillance who will check you place out and make sure one of those six cops did not slip a listening device in a flower pot. You should also ditch the router when it is returned, unless you are able to take it apart and satisfy yourself that it has been modified to spy on you.

Of course, if everything you do on your computer or say in the privacy of your own home or over the telephone is as pure and innocent as the driven snow, then you have nothing to worry about.

The best use of your computing equipment would be to donate to a overseas charity. Of course you never claimed to have sole access to your computers and any number of people had access to them, who you didn’t keep record of. Be-aware of police officers and their superiors behaving nicely, its always a temporary aberration.
Brazil is nice at this time of year. The Bigg’s memorial fund offers help..

I don’t know whether FOIA sent you an email or just posted on your blog, but, the police would appear to be hoping to get routing information and ip/machine address information on any communications you received. The router may actually preserve some of this also.

Good luck.
[Reply] Thanks. IMO the police don’t really believe FOIA would be stupid enough to contact me by email. Whoever it is, they just placed a comment with a link on half a dozen blogs. Why I’m being singled out, I don’t know. – Rog

“Why I’m being singled out, I don’t know” Could it be ‘cos you are in England?
Have CA and AV been raided? I guess that the US action was at the request of the UK. Who in the US is bothered about a hack/leak at the CRU?

Why is anyone in the UK that bothered? Well remember the CRU backup server was tucked away in one of the the UEA’s two central computer facilities not in Phil’s ivory tower. So maybe unless and until they know how it was done they do not know if a lot of other stuff at UEA is vulnerable. We have tended to lampoon the UEA but in fairness it is an important place regardless of the CRU. After all the PRS got his PhD there.

Also, since there may be some commonality in kit and s/w with other rather more important places than UEA, perhaps there are very real national security concerns.

[…] attack free-thinkers December 16, 2011By albannachpolice attack free-thinkersThis – police raid tallbloke, is very nearly the last straw. Surely, this cannot be legal, search warrant or not. When did we […]

RE: Bernd Felsche
==
BTW: When the computers are returned, don’t trust their integrity. If at all possible, leave them in the sealed evidence bags until they can be vetted by an independent party. Check the seals. Consider the hardware to be compromised as well as the system’s data until they are independently verified.
==
Do not trust the integrity either way. If machines/drives are seized, they should have been placed into sealed evidence bags WHEN TAKEN (and before removal from site), and you should sign a document agreeing WHAT was taken, along with the bag number/seal number.

As they will be cloned/investigated, they will obviously be de-bagged so as to be accessed, and then (possibly) re-sealed/re-bagged. In either case, they are no-longer trustworthy.

I see there are a couple of negative messages. Rather than them condemning you and saying this is karma – they should be condemning those that hid the decline, corrupted peer review and condemning Phil Jones for what he said about the death of John Daly. The double standards of these people is what made me a sceptic.

I’m presently practising as an ICT Forensic Expert. I do a lot of cases involving computers, phones & Internet. I work almost entirely for the defence.

If you want to contact me for some advice on computer raids and the use of evidence and strategies, let me know. I’ll give what advice I can gratis.

I can say in advance that even if you are totally innocent of whatever you are suspected of, it will cost you an awful lot of money. Lawyers are not cheap at all and the process you have been involuntarily embarked on is certainly going to be expensive. My advice may help to lower this cost a bit.

Everywhere in the World: Bill approved yesterday in the Peruvian Parliament: “Any person who improperly interferes, listening or broadcasting a private communication, regardless of the medium through which it has taken place shall be punished by deprivation of liberty no less than two nor more than four years”

Sorry about that, I pasted instead of copying.
Are you following the work being done on Chefio’s forum?
He is not so much looking at the data the rest of the sites have been looking and what he is finding looks like political dynamite.

I guess mine will be next, after all I had the temerity to place an FOI request and the police rang me up about it. When I suggested they were on the wrong track, the comment was ” we have to be seen to be doing something”

Roger, are you aware of this rule about magistrates authorising search warrants:-

From the Liberty website

Magistrates should only issue warrants under this section if there are reasonable grounds for believing that the police will not be able to obtain access to the evidence without a warrant, for example, if consent will not be forthcoming.

I understand you were interviewed after Climategate 1, an were fully co-operative – so IMHO the police should have first requested your co-operation before resorting to a warrant. Especially since they have confirmed you were never suspected of a crime.

Something that you might not be aware about is a case that happened in Canada relating to a “criminal” investigation. This involved a blog host being shut down by his ISP because he allegedly breached their terms and conditions. The point here is that the FBI were after the Al Qaeda run “Inspire” magazine.

Here is the sequence of events: the FBI contacted the Web host for the blog host and gave them a similar letter to the one given to WordPress. The Webhost was in the USA (I think). The owner of the blog host was not around at the time so that he was not contactable. The FBI took the server that contained all of our blogs on the blog host site. The next thing that happened was that the Webhost shut down the blog host, which meant that all of the blogs on the site were shutdown. The excuse about terms and conditions being breached was a very thin one. The blog owner did get some compensation and he was able to set up the blog host site again and restore the blogs, except for Inspire.

It came to me that the FBI had cause to seek the information about the “Inspire Magazine” because of the content. Keep in mind that some would be terrorists have used the site to help build kitchen bombs. The bloghost owner was not the target of any investigation. He does have a duty though to ensure that no copyrighted material appears in any blogs using his host facilities.

After thinking about why the plods wanted to clone those computers, the only thing that I can think of is that they believe that they can get the wordpress password by examining the computer. If you have not already done so, I suggest that you change the password so that they cannot gain access.

[…] Further to the story earlier about a blogger’s computers being seized by Norfolk police on what seemed very dubious grounds, the victim is a blogger named “TallBloke”, who records events on the day here. […]

[…] I’m posting later than I planned this morning. Overnight, the Norfolk police, on the advice of the US department of justice, raided Tallbloke, who was instrumental in breaking the emails that discussed Micheal Mann and his crew deliberately subverting peer review, and have becume known as climategate. They have also asked that his wordpress.com account be frozen. He is now being libelled. His account is here. […]

Have they returned your computers yet? It seems to me that it would take far less than 24 hours to make a full mirror copy of your hard disk. It’s not totally trivial, since they want all the deleted stuff and operating files too, but it’s hardly rocket science.

They can’t actually work off you computers – as that would affect the very evidence they seek and would ruin it for any court case (of you or anybody else). They have to work off mirror copies. Once they make one, they can make as many as they want.

You should ask them to return the physical computers immediately. They don’t need them. And a copy of the mirror copies they made in a form that can’t be altered — such as DVDs.

Hi Tallbloke,
I’ve been a reader at your site for quite a while now. I especially love the solar geomagnetic science debates you have with other commentators.

I also read many other sites on ‘climate science’, and can see why our channels of communication are a concern to the other side. The visit to your home has only served to strengthen the resolve of us sceptics. It seems the more they challenge us, the more we rally.

And FOIA, if you’re looking. Take care. Our debt to you is beyond measure.

In every field of human endeavour throughout the ages, be it art, music, sport, politics, war, or whatever you want to name, there are single events or decisions which have totally changed the course of history. Without wishing to sound overly dramatic, I believe the raid on Tallbloke is one such milepost.

Where have you ever seen such a combined outpouring of support from so many of the giants of the blogosphere and their many erudite and well-known, well-loved posters! Like many of you who have suffered so much anger and frustration at media and governmental bias in suppressing justifiable scepticism and criticism of the attempted UNIPCC AGW scientific and financial fraud, I am sure you cannot help but be gladdened by seeing the concentration of intellect being assembled and motivated to resist this latest assault on civil rights and individual freedom.

Though trillions of dollars are amassed against us (e.g; IIGCC et al and the UN), this old Tasmanian heart has been revitalised with new hope that common sense and truth will eventually prevail.

Tallbloke, with that wonderful humour and attitude to life, you won’t be broken, that’s for sure!

The Norfolk police subsequently confirmed that they were “investigating criminal offences in relation to a data breach at the University of East Anglia” with the assistance of the Metropolitan Police’s Central e-Crime unit,[23] the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) and the National Domestic Extremism Team (NDET).[26] Commenting on the involvement of the NDET, a spokesman said: “At present we have two police officers assisting Norfolk with their investigation, and we have also provided computer forensic expertise. While this is not strictly a domestic extremism matter, as a national police unit we had the expertise and resource to assist with this investigation, as well as good background knowledge of climate change issues in relation to criminal investigations.” However, the police cautioned that “major investigations of this nature are of necessity very detailed and as a consequence can take time to reach a conclusion.”[27] As of November 2011, the investigation was still underway.[28]

25^ Webster, Ben (21 November 2009). “Sceptics publish climate emails ‘stolen from East Anglia University'”. The Times (UK). Archived from the original on 6 January 2010. Retrieved 27 July 2010. “An anonymous statement accompanying the emails said: “We feel that climate science is too important to be kept under wraps. We hereby release a random selection of correspondence, code, and documents. Hopefully it will give some insight into the science and the people behind it.””

Before all, Tallbloke´s blog, it is and it was, taking into account his background:
I’m a qualified engineer and a graduate of the History and Philosophy of Science. I’m interested in finding out how the solar system works and how Earth is affected by changes in it.
An “Agora” of philosophy, of philosophy of science, as in the times of the ancient Greek “Agora”, an open temple under the Sun, a corner of a city`s square where free citizens congregate to talk about what the rest of “commoners” do not care or can not care, because of having to deal with the daily struggle for survival. A source of higher energy to be transmitted, shared, given, to the confused and afflicted by current conflicts and personal enigmas.
Such a phenomenon has repeatedly arisen in the history of humanity as a beacon to guide with its light to real knowledge in order to answer to answer the old burning question: Who am I?
A reiterative Delphi fighting against darkness.
Then it is not about “freedom of press” or whatever it may be called in our “modern times” ,this “Age of the Feuilleton”, as the “Magister Ludi” could call it (*), it is about the fight between the forces of good, of negentropy versus the forces of evil, following the involutionary tendencies, of entropy, the self indulgence of thanatos, the self destructive desire. Eros vs. Thanatos (Thanatos (Greek: Θάνατος (Thánatos), “Death,”[1] from θνῄσκω – thnēskō, “to die, be dying”[2]) was the daemon personification of death.)
The thanatophile can not bear himself a lonely death, he wants us all to follow him in his self destructive quest, thus he associates with others sharing his irrational tendencies, and, while he is convinced he is doing the best for the rest, he and his comrades, destroy the fruits of the labour of the normal and sane people: This is why liberals, free thinkers of the west, in special after the so called democratic “French Revolution”, share common ideals with those fanatics of the east.
Then let us be clear about what it is happening now in the world and let us not worry about: Life, eros, always prevails.
(*)Herman Hesse´s “Magister Ludi” or “The Glass Bead Game”

[…] A fellow WordPress.com blogger has had his house raided by the police and all his computers were confiscated by the Norfolk and London Metropolitan police in Britain . The blogger, Roger Tattersall is suspected of being connected with the release of the Climategate e-mails two years ago ( Norfolk is very slow ) and he has been able to post a brief article describing the raid – click Tallbloke towers raided . […]

P.G. Sharrow says:
December 19, 2011 at 5:12 pm“I believe our host wanted to make a valuable contribution to the worlds understanding of climate science. I doubt he had all this in mind…”

Hi PG,

I’m sure that with his background in the history of science, Rog would have been half expecting something like this to happen eventually. Climatology stopped being a science a long time ago and has become a political football -sponsored by those power crazed individuals wanting a new world order. GCHQ must have been amazed to see the swelling numbers of ordinary citizens joining the ranks of the sceptical null hypothesis crusaders and would have been shocked when reporting the scale of the problem to their bosses.

The current widespread ‘dirty tricks’ action being taken is a sure sign of the desperation they are feeling, and I think it is part of a last ditch attempt to scare dissenters. However, looking at the levels of interest their actions have stimulated, it is obvious that this plan has backfired.

We must be ever vigilant in watching for new strategies which will be developed to further their cause and nip them in the bud before they can become entrenched like CAGW. Always remember that we are many, but they are few. Freedom is always worth fighting for, whatever the cost to the individual.

tytower~
Being an American myself (though now living in Canada), I can assure you that most of the American public are either unaware of these events (Climategate 1.0, 2.0, Tallbloke, etc), thanks to the Leftist media, and a lot of those who Are aware of these events, are actively promoting falsehoods about them to their devoted followers (huffporn comes to mind).

I will always maintain that the vast majority of people simple do NOT have the time to learn about these things- daily life is busy enough- and so follow whomever best fits their thinking.

And to others who might see this: when I say Leftist, I do not mean all liberals. Not by a long shot. But it sure as Hell AIN’T the right that promotes this junk.

How many empires have there been in the last 10,000 years? Wasn’t one of the more recent ones, YOURS, tytower? And it was spread a hell of a lot further than the US ever went.
And I seem to recall it’s glory days were about putting an end to two other attempts at Empire, one in Europe, the other in Asia, neither of which would have been good for all of us.
*sighs* moving on…

You are of course correct. But I note with amusement that of all the majors, only Fox has even touched on the story. And that as news, not commentary (they may have on commentary as well, I just do not pay attention). For that, the left and their sycophants vilify them and call them all sorts of names (never being able to substantiate any of their allegations, as robots do not think, they just regurgitate).

I saw a bumber sticker recently that stated “Educate America – turn off Fox News”. Talk about false advertising – the sticker should have read “Indoctrinate America”. But of course the difference woudl be so far over the driver’s head as to be wasted on his intellect.

There is a 200 year old”Hopi” Indian Prophecy that says “The new era would begin when a net covers the world”.
Main stream media is still trying to ignore this story, the BBC included, The battle is not won, merely joined. I too do not trust this media reporter to give an honest report that gets published. Engard Sir, and good luck to you. pg

PhilJ.;
The Left is desperate to “turn off Fox News”. It has viewership equal to the next 4 or so competitors combined. With a healthy sprinkling of leftist contributors/commentators, while the competition has approximately zero center or right commentators.

[…] AEI, AEI, AEI, Family Security Matters, Stonegate Institute, Watts Up With That?, The Telegraph, Tallbloke’s Talkshop, The Washington Examiner, The Register, The National Post, The American Thinker, The American […]

[…] inaccuracy’ for this piece, as I did with Guardian reporter Leo Hickman in the wake of the raid on Tallbloke Towers by Lincolnshire police last December. But that doesn’t cover it. The Guardian’s smear […]

[…] As Talkshop readers know, Prof Michael Mann isn’t on my christmas card list, since he repeated Greg Laden’s libel against me and added some further innuendo in the NYT article by Leslie Kaufman written following the raid on tallbloke towers. […]

[…] raid on the home of an anti wind farm campaigner in Scotland on Christmas eve 2011, soon after the raid on Tallbloke Towers, where anti-terrorism legislation was employed in order to confiscate my […]